The ideological progression of the women's question in colonial india 1820-1947

The Ideological Progression of the Women's Question in Colonne book provide hit Panjani, my colleague at the Goo Library & Research Centre. The book provides a historical and analytical account of the emergence of The quest for women's rights and equality during the course of a century and quarter spanning Much of the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century. This periodis marked by considerable intellectual and ideological turmoil, contestation and progress on the issue of Women's struggle for equality in a society marked by strong paternalistic structures and acceptance of a subordinate position of women as naturally ordained. Subjection of women to the authority of men, both within the home and in the outside world was considered a pan of this Natural order. In fact women's agency was almost totally absent outside the home. The subordinate role of women was upheld ideologically by the dominant ideas that drew their Inspiration from a particular interpretation of the so-called religiously sanctioned Dharmasastra Texts especially Manusmriti, in the case of the Hindus and the Sharia in the case of the Muslims

"Dharmasastra" it has been said, "became influential in modern colonial India history, when they Were formulated by early British colonial administrators to be the law of the land for all non-Muslims (Hindus, Jains, Buddhists, Sikhs) in India, after Sharia was already accepted as the law For Muslims in colonial India"(Wikipedia).

It goes to the credit of many enlightened men and women who challenged the subordinate status assigned to women in India society and waged a relentless struggle for abolition of reprehensible practices like Sati, child marriage, poor treatment of widows and worked towards emancipation of women through education. They put their weight behind the revolutionary (at that time) idea of equality for women. Many distinguished nineteenth century reformers, both women and men, played an important role in this respect. Some prominent names that come to mind include Begum Rokeya Hussain, Tarabai Shinde, Rassundari Devi, Pandita Ramabai Saraswati, and Savitribai Phule among women and Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, Akshay Kumar Dutta, Jotiba Phule, Justice Mahadev Govind Ranade, Swami Vivekanand, K.T. Telang and Swami Dayanand Saraswati among men. Under the influence

of Mahatma Gandhi women also took active part in the freedom movement.

A few of the well-known active women freedom Fighters wer Annie Besant, Bhikaji Cama, Kasturba Gandhi, Sarojini Naidu, Arun Asaf Ali, Sucheta Kripalani, Vijaylakshmi Pandit and Durgabai Deshmukh. They were active participants in the Congress Party sessions and collectively raised the issue of women's equality. Annie Besant was elected as the President of the India National Congress in 1917.

In order to appreciate the full significance of the movement for women's rights in the nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century India, it is important to place the development in the context of the situation in other parts of the world, especially England. omen in England during this period could hardly be called emancipated. The nineteenth century saw the beginnings of the women's rights movement in the United States and England and the struggle for suffrage for women. The early movement for women's rights, it has been said, was related to the anti-slavery movement, especially in the USA. At the same time Europe and the United States were in the midst of major political and socio-economic transformation that influenced the Spread of concern for women's rights. Social life in England, on other hand, was influenced by Victorian values for much of the nineteenth century, Victorian values justified restriction of Women's role to the home and family leading to severe restrictions on their rights. "In the Victorian era women were seen, by the middle classes at least, as belonging to the domestic Sphere, and this stereotype required them to provide their husbands with a clean home, food on the table and to raise their children. Women's rights were extremely limited in this era, losing ownership of their wages, all of their physical property, excluding land property. and all other cash they generated, once married. When a Victorian man and woman married, the rights of the woman were legally given over to her spouse."(Wikipedia) Thus women in nineteenth century India faced a situation quite similar to what women in the rest of the world, especially England and the United State, faced. To that extent the movement for Women's rights and equality in India can be seen and understood in the context of the wider movement for women's equality elsewhere in the world.